United States Trump administration has second time in a row missed its deadline to issue a notification on its decision to terminate the work authorisation of H-4 visa holders, mostly Indians who are spouses of professionals having H-1B visas.

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) had informed a United States court in March that it was working to issue a Notice of Proposed Rule Making in June this year.

“I have no updates to provide at this time,” a DHS official told PTI, noting that he cannot speculate on when a decision would be made.

Meanwhile, two research scholars in a study paper said: “the unpredictability of these impending changes” to American visa restrictions would not only cause financial strain but was already also causing a psychological burden on families, particularly the spouses of expatriates in these families.

“Furthermore, cancelling work permits of spouses could negatively affect business operations for major IT companies,” said Pooja B Vijayakumar, a doctoral student at the Kemmy Business School, Limerick, Ireland, and Christopher J L Cunningham from the University of Tennessee, at Chattanooga.

“If the current American presidential administration goes ahead with the plan to cancel work permits for spouses of expatriates, IT organisations and businesses will have to come up with an action plan to support spouses to prevent or at least minimise turnover of critical members of their highly talented IT workforces,” the research paper said.